DH and I are trying to climb out of debt, but I'm very frustrated with the sjy-high interest rate his card charges. His card charges 23.99%, although he just managed to talk them down to 18%. Mine charges 8.75%. Naturally, I tried to transfer his balance to mine, but for some reason that still isn't clear to me, they won't do it. I really ddon't understand that since my account has always been in good standing, but whatever. What I'd like to do now is see if I can find an introductory offer on a new card, preferably one that will offer something below 10% for the first x number of months, and transfer his balance to that. How do I do that?

I realize this all sounds very bad, but we got into debt last year when DH was sick and couldn't work, and we're not using the credit cards AT ALL anymore now, but I'm just so discouraged by these interest rates. We're barely denting the principal because the interest payments are so high. WWYD?

Research very carefully! My DH transfered a large balance to a Chase card that had a 0% interest rate for 15 months. He made the payments faithfully (over the minimum) and they "anaylized his credit report" (which was perfect) and raised his rate up to 29.9% in a matter 4 months. No amount of negociating would get them to reconsider. His minimum payment on that card was almost two weeks pay and he's been forced to file bankrupcy. Check out ripoffreports.com before you transfer anything. FWIW. Citi bank and Compass never raised his rates, just Chase.

I agree with the previous post. The new laws have made it very easy for the CC companies to screw you with a rate increase whether you pay ontime or not. Usually to get 0% you have to get an offer in the mail. This usually happens if you have your cards below 30% of their credit line and a certain credit score. Another easy way is to pay off your card first and then once they see the balance is 0 they will panic and send you an offer. Personally I hate the litlle BBBB: for the way they handle their credit policy.

I don't know about balance transfers but I just got my amex blue card that started me off with 0% interest for 15 months. I got it because we had to move and there were lots of expenses that we didn't have cash for but we can definitely pay it off before 15 months.

Thanks for the tips! Ugh, looking around for a new card really goes against everything that feels right, but I don't know what else to do. We've always been very disciplined with money and we never had cc debt before this, so the whole thing just unnerves me. It's hard not to be in panic mode; I feel like I want to do whatever it takes to get rid of our debt NOW, but OTOH, I don't want to do anything stupid.

I'll look into AmEx Blue card. I was under the impression, though, that AmEx requires you to pay the balance off in full at the end of every month. Has that changed?

If you are a new customer and they offer the 0% interest rate for the first fifteen month, you can have a balance on the card and they won't charge any finance charges unless you don't pay the monthly minimum ( mine was like $15 dollars). However with all credit cards or financing offers that give you a certain number of month with 0% interest rate you have to pay off the card within the amount of time they give you or else they tack on the interest at the end of the 15months.

Amex blue also comes with a reward program where you can get 1% back on all purchases in gift certificates. Personally I like it because I just got out of school and into my first job. I had some savings to cover apartment deposit, first month rent, however I had to buy many new things for our place like vaccum cleaner and kitchenware, and furniture. I put lots of things on the card but I think I should be able to pay it off before 15months

Have you looked into MBNA (which I think was bought by Bank Of America) they dont have 0% interest but they have VERY LOW interest rate consilidation and they give you a choice on how much you want to borrow, 10,000, 15, 20 etc. and they tell you how much you pay back a month and they let you choose how many years you want to pay it back in.

My sister just took a loan from them... I think it was 15,000 and she pays about $270 for 72 months (I think). Also she doesnt have really good credit so she was suprised she qualified but she some how she did.

Another poster mentioned this but DONT open a Chase account because they did the same thing to me and raised my interest rate by 10% even though nothing had changed in my credit report!

we get 0% cc offers all the time but I think it is because we have good credit. We've actually used them when we've had $$ issues like broken plumbing. It helps to have time to pay off debt without interest. But, I don't think you can get them if your credit is not super. You need to start with your credit. Go to https://www.annualcreditreport.com/cra/index.jsp and get your credit report. This is the only place where it is truly free. Never pay for the basic report. If you have issues, you might want to pay to get it more than once a year, to check, but start with this. This will give you the info you need to know about. Then, silly as this sounds, oprah has some great information on her website, http://www.oprah.com/money/debtdiet/...iet_main.jhtml. CHeck it out and see what you can do for yourself. You may not be able to get a 0% credit card but you can learn how to work your way down the interest rates and out of debt.

Your credit doesn't have to be super to get (and qualify for) those offers. Mine's only fair and I've done that recently. Start reading all those junk mail credit offers you get until you find one that fits the criteria you're looking for. It took me about 4 months of casual looking to find the one I wanted (I went with Discover), but I was being pretty picky.

Wow, it's very interesting to hear those negative things about Chase. My sister, who is extremely responsible with credit and has great credit, recently tried to up the $1000 limit on her one credit card, Capital One, before she went on her honeymoon, and they refused to do it, even though she's been a customer for years and always pays off her balance. So she called up Chase and they opened a $20K card for her, then she cancelled her Capital One card.

Thanks for all the feedback, ladies! Boongirl, thank your for the links; I have both bookmarked. I've actually already checked my and dh's credit report this year, and everything was in order, although it didn't give me out FICO scores, which I would have found interesting. You're right about Oprah's site being a good resource, though. Who knew? :

Godaime, I ended up applying for the AmEx Blue card since they ofered 4.99% on all balance transfers until it was paid off. I suppose I could have waited until a 0% offer came along, but I'm the type of person who likes to take care of stuff NOW once I make up my mind to do them. I don't really trust MBNA anymore since that's who dh's card is with now, and after I read the fine print about the Blue card, it sounded pretty clear-cut, so hopefully this will work out!

Wow, it's very interesting to hear those negative things about Chase. My sister, who is extremely responsible with credit and has great credit, recently tried to up the $1000 limit on her one credit card, Capital One, before she went on her honeymoon, and they refused to do it, even though she's been a customer for years and always pays off her balance. So she called up Chase and they opened a $20K card for her, then she cancelled her Capital One card.

I'd suspect that Chase did that to eventually get her on interest. Maybe I'm being overly pessimistic, but I can't help it. They raised my husband's limit from 8k to 13k then when he charged it to 12,800 (he was unemployed and it really screwed him up) they considered him "high risk" and the rates skyrocketed. After all of this happened I started reading about it and found a TON of info about them doing the same thing to other people.